New Drug Routes Through Lawless Libya Raise Questions About ISIS’ Role

In a story that reads like a crime thriller, The New York Times’ Rukmini Callimachi and Lorenzo Tondo reported last week on new routes for smuggling hashish from Morocco to Europe that raise suspicions about whether the self-proclaimed Islamic State is profiting off the drug trade. The hashish routes wind their way across the eastern Mediterranean through Libya, a roundabout passage that avoids the usual short run—often on small boats and even jet skis—across the Strait of Gibraltar to Spain.

There are two reasons for the new route, Callimachi and Tondo write: more police surveillance along the Spanish coast in recent years and, in 2011, Libya’s descent into chaos after the ouster of Moammar Gadhafi. Large freighters now go east across the North African coast, stopping in Libya, where their shipments often continue overland through Egypt and the Middle East, entering Europe through the Balkans. ...